Balanced Highways 4

The Challenge

Immeasurable natural beauty, world-class recreation, and small-town charm are at the heart of what people love about Jackson Hole and are also at the center of the area’s greatest challenges. Lack of workforce housing in proximity to available service sector jobs, and pressures from rapid growth in visitation result from the valley’s strong draw. Traffic congestion and the resultant impacts of automobiles on wildlife and community character are among the impacts that residents, organizations, and government are struggling to manage.

In recent years, travelers often experience big city levels of congestion on WY-22 and WY390; both were constructed as rural two-lane highways, but are now being asked to handle as many as 4,300 cars per hour during a busy summer afternoon. This congestion has negative impacts on people who live, work, and visit Jackson Hole and impacts wildlife in the corridor, particularly:

• Wildlife crossings

• Local travelers

• Commuters

• Businesses – trouble attracting workers

At first glance, the fix may seem easy. Widen the roadways and traffic congestion will disappear. However, as explained earlier, the science of highway management shows us that adding more capacity for vehicles to a highway already clogged with vehicles just induces more demand for driving, exacerbating all other negative externalities of auto use, and after significant investment and disruption from highway construction leaves people stuck in traffic. While there is ample scientific evidence for this phenomenon, the anecdotal evidence can be tracked by every time you’ve heard some say, “I avoid driving to Wilson in the late afternoon.”

WY-22 and WY-390 have several other unique characteristics that demand locally sensitive solutions. The graphic on the following page illustrates these issues.